This book provides a wide-ranging review of the European rules relating to distribution: exclusive purchase and exclusive supply, exclusive and selective distribution, motor vehicle distribution, franchises, commercial agents.

French Distribution Law

The distributor has a right to use the brand, but this is precarious and limited and must be free of any unfair practices. This is the case where a reseller uses the brand of his supplier and his position as exclusive distributor to promote a competing product . Disputes also concern the use of the brand on the internet. By using its supplier's brand as a domain name without its authorization, the …

Right to use the brand.

The distributor has a right to use the brand, but this is precarious and limited and must be free of any unfair practices. This is the case where a reseller uses the brand of his supplier and his position as exclusive distributor to promote a competing product . Disputes also concern the use of the brand on the internet. By using its supplier's brand as a domain name without its authorization, the exclusive distributor commits an act of parasitism . In effect, such use generates a risk of confusion in consumers' minds as they are led to think that this is the supplier's official website. By contrast, this is not the case where the distributor uses a domain name including the manufacturer's brand as it had been authorized to do, and the termination of the agreement takes place only after the writ of summons . 

The distributor may affix his own brand instead of the supplier's on the contract goods where this option has been tacitly agreed by them in relation to their commercial distribution strategy for France . However, he will be guilty of trade mark infringement if he sells products that he has assembled himself under the supplier's brand  or exceeds the powers conferred by the supplier over the brand by registering part of its signs, designs and models, after copying the packaging of the contract goods in order to commercialize its own competing products presented as original products having undergone a name change . The prohibition on a distributor registering the trade marks and designs of its supplier applies even if it had participated in their design . Therefore, a distributor may not knowingly register as a trademark the signs necessary for his supplier's activity without the latter's agreement, by unjustifiably reserving for himself, for the French territory, the definitive exclusivity of distribution, or at least auditing the use of the signs necessary for this distribution . Similarly, the distributor should not tarnish the manufacturer's brand image: it has been held that a distributor had breached his obligation to exploit the brand in an effective, serious and fair manner insofar as he had been put in the position of defendant in a number of legal disputes brought by members of the franchising network that he had set up . On the other hand, the supplier cannot be criticized for not registering the trade mark when that fact has not caused the distributor any problems relative to its exploitation .

The right to use the brand ceases on termination of the contract. The distributor must then remove the distinctive signs and stop using them or face action for unlawful use of the brand and/or unfair competition. If a distributor, after the termination of the agreement, organizes an aggressive campaign to publicize the liquidation of stocks of the contract goods, he breaches his obligation to dispose of any sign likely to imply that there is still a link with the brand and his obligation of discretion .

CA Paris, 27 November 2019, LawLex201900001491JBJ.

TGI Nanterre, 20 March 2000, LawLex200200000817JBJ.

CA Nancy, 2 October 2013, LawLex201300001464JBJ.

CA Versailles, 14 September 2000, LawLex200200000743JBJ.

CA Paris, 19 December 2012, LawLex201300000004JBJ.

CA Amiens, 11 October 2012, LawLex201200002177JBJ.

CA Paris, 6 November 2014, LawLex201400001217JBJ; CA Aix-en-Provence, 7 September 2023, LawLex202300011348JBJ.

TGI Paris, 1 December 2016, LawLex201600002071JBJ. Also see CA Paris, 7 November 2017, LawLex201700001840JBJ, holding that the exclusive French distributor which, unbeknownst to its Italian supplier, registers the trade marks of the latter for its own account, commits an act of infringement and is liable to pay EUR 60,000 in damages.

TJ Paris, 25 October 2024, LawLex202400008695JBJ.

CA Grenoble, 6 October 2011, LawLex201100001776JBJ.

CA Lyon, 3 March 2016, LawLex201600000537JBJ.

French Distribution Law

100. Right to use the brand.

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Les décisions de justice citées dans ce paragraphe :

Les notions juridiques connexes

100. Right to use the brand.

Demandez un accès gratuit au contenu exclusif Livv – juristes d’entreprise

Les décisions de justice citées dans ce paragraphe :

Les notions juridiques connexes

Demandez un accès gratuit
au contenu exclusif Livv – juristes d’entreprise